The government is working to transform state institutions into modern, technology-driven organisations to ensure transparency and accountability in public resource management, taking a firm stance against past misuse of public funds and illicit financial outflows, says State Minister for Planning Zonayed Abdur Rahim Saki.
He made the remark on Sunday while speaking at the formal inauguration ceremony of the Strengthening Institutions for Transparency and Accountability (SITA) project organised at a hotel in the capital.
The World Bank-supported umbrella project, involving five major components, aims to modernise five key public institutions - the Planning Division, Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS), National Board of Revenue (NBR), Bangladesh Public Procurement Authority (BPPA), and the Office of the Comptroller and Auditor General (OCAG).
World Bank Divisional Director for Bangladesh and Bhutan Jean Pesme, NBR Chairman Abdur Rahman Khan, IMED Secretary Shirajun Noor Chowdhury, and BPPA Chief Executive Officer SM Moin Uddin Ahmed spoke at the event, among others.
The programme was chaired by Planning Division Secretary SM Shakil Akhter, while Planning Division Joint Secretary and Project Director Nasimur Rahman Sharif delivered the welcome address.
Saki said the project would help make the activities of the participating institutions more modern, integrated, and technology-based.
"Increasing the digital capacity of these institutions will bring qualitative changes in revenue collection, public expenditure management, data generation, auditing, and development planning," he said.
He also said increasing domestic revenue mobilisation was one of the government's key priorities, but achieving the target required fundamental reforms in the tax system.
"Revenue collection cannot be increased unless the tax system becomes transparent, effective, and technology-driven. Through automation, it will be possible to increase the number of taxpayers and expand the tax base," Saki said.
The state minister said Bangladesh's budget size remained low compared to that of its economy, while the demand for increased spending on health, education, social protection, and infrastructure continued to rise.
"If we need to allocate 5 per cent of the GDP for health and education each, how will we manage other development activities with the remaining resources?" he questioned.
World Bank's Pesme said strong and transparent institutions were critical for Bangladesh's next phase of economic growth and job creation.
"Bangladesh's next phase of growth - and the jobs it must create - depends on strong, transparent institutions that people and investors can trust," he said.
"The SITA project will help modernise core government systems while strengthening data quality so that decisions are better informed, results are tracked more effectively, and accountability is reinforced," Pesme added.
NBR's Khan said Bangladesh needed to significantly raise its tax-to-GDP ratio to create the fiscal space required for development.
He stressed the need to prevent revenue leakages by making tax systems and processes more transparent and integrating government platforms to ensure better information sharing.
BPPA's Ahmed said the authority was working on establishing a fully digital, transparent, data-driven, and citizen-centric public procurement system.
"By 2030, we want to introduce a modern, secure, and cloud-ready e-GP Version 2.0 platform under this project," he said.
The planning secretary said the SITA project was highly important for the Planning Division, which would provide strategic leadership in implementation and ensure effective coordination among participating agencies.
Md Najmul Alam, deputy secretary at the Planning Division, presented the keynote paper, highlighting the key features, objectives, and activities of the project.
He said the SITA project was not only about introducing digital systems but also about creating stronger coordination among government institutions.
"Digital transformation will help connect different government systems, improve information sharing, and make decision-making faster and more effective," he also said.
Officials said fragmented systems had often created challenges in planning, monitoring, and implementing development programmes.
Once government platforms were integrated, policymakers would have better access to reliable information and would be able to make decisions based on evidence, they added.
The five-year project, running from July 2025 to June 2030, has an estimated cost of Tk 32.88 billion, of which Tk 30.43 billion will come from the World Bank's concessional lending window, the International Development Association (IDA).
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